Tremendously Tremendous

Me: I'm kind of starting to have a crush on Eddie Olczyk.

BrownsFan: (horrified) Not...physically...right?

Me: Um, well not really because I think he'd keep yelling "stop it right here" all the time. And that wouldn't be fun.

BrownsFan: ....Ok.

Me: I just think he's really funny and intelligent and I sort of like his little accent (giggle).

BrownsFan: Look, I know you finally had your way with [boy who doesn't call], but I REALLY think you need to go to Bermuda and have sex all week so you're not so...

Me: Boy crazy?

BrownsFan: Obsessed.

A Trip Down Memory Lane: Six Years of Bullshit Bizzybiz

For the first time in six years I have realized that it is my blogaversary on the actual day of my blogaversary. Six years ago today, I posted two very short blog posts: one because I was upset that CAKE hadn't scheduled a show in Cleveland until after I'd already driven all the way to Columbus to see them and the other because earlier that day, the CEO of the company I was working for at the time had asked the question "What is the process of statement processing?" which he thought constituted a double entendre (per the fabulous Mary (who I miss terribly) immediately after leaving that meeting, "I believe the word you're looking for is 'redundancy'. 'REDUNDANCY'!"). And thus Bizzybiz was born.

I started a blog primarily because I had started reading the blog of Salam Pax a.k.a. the Baghdad Blogger, a young Iraqi architect who was writing an amazing blog about what he was experiencing as a resident of Baghdad while we were bombing it called "Where is Raed?". I was tremendously impressed with his writing but moreover I was completely fascinated with the medium. The idea that regular people could share anything they wanted to say with everyone in the world who had an internet connection seemed completely amazing to me back then. H-town also had a blog at the time (she's been on extended hiatus for a few years) which turned out to be instrumental in changing our relationship from college buddies who called to catch up once in a while to the one we have now where she is my very best friend because it enabled me to keep up with her life on a daily basis. Also it was frikkin' hilarious. I wanted in.

I don't think I've ever taken the time to explain what "bizzybiz" actually means. I named this journal "The Bizzybiz Blog" because of an incident that occurred in close proximity to the time I started think about starting a blog. When I worked at the number factory, there was another company on the same floor of our building and like most office high rises, everyone on the floor shared a bathroom. Most of the women who worked there were nice when you'd run into them at the sinks, but there was this one angry looking red-headed girl who would scowl at you every time you walked in as if you were scum coughed up from hell just to ruin her private hand washing moment. The women of my company were discussing it on our way to the sundry shop to buy cigarettes (this was also right around the time that I tried to take up smoking because I wanted to be a cool kid. I hated it and couldn't stand to have a cigarette unless I also had a big glass of chocolate milk to kill that horrible charred ass taste. It was my smokin' milk. This adventure lasted 4 months before I finally woke up and said "What the fuck am I DOING?") and I said something along the lines of "That girl is a biz-atch" because I sometimes like to talk like Snoop Dogg. Bia, who was from Romania and who spoke impeccable English except for when she was trying to repeat words I had just made up, agreed with me by saying "Yeah! She is a...bizzybiz! Or whatever you just said." The new word wound up being a staple of our conversations. So "Bizzybiz Blog" literally translates as "Bitch Blog". Now you know.

When I first started the blog, I didn't set up a stat counter because I am an incorrigible narcissist and I would never have gotten anything done because I would have constantly been checking to see how many page views I had. Fortunately or unfortunately, earlier this year when blogger did a redesign, one of the changes they made was a tab that automatically tracks your stats whether you asked for it or not. I am fucking obsessed with my stats now, exactly as I predicted (to be fair, so is the comic. "How many page views do you get per day?" he wanted to know last week as we both kept frantically hitting the refresh button.). What I found out was I have a LOT more lurkers than I realized, and in places I wouldn't have expected. For instance, I have far more pageviews in the Netherlands than I do in the U.K. despite the fact that I go to England to visit friends every year but have never been to Holland and don't know anyone Dutch. India and South Korea seem to have taken a great deal of interest as well. Also, hello to my lovely readers in China, I am pleased that you are here since I just assumed I was banned in China. People seem to find the site while searching for some really bizarre things ("slutty Hogwarts", "men and women licking frosting", "huge naked grandma boobs"). The most viewed blog post is Amber And The Intern: Bad Wedding Guests  and I have absolutely no idea why unless the intern is running around driving people to that page (thanks if you are. I still think your decision to take up the bagpipes is really weird). I've also want to say thanks to a couple of readers who have been around since the beginning: my wonderful Canadian friend Pronto and the amazing but spider loving monogodo whose home I will never be visiting as he and his wife have surrounded themselves with tarantulas. You guys rock.

Thanks to each and every one of my Bizzybiz readers for your inexplicable interest in the ramblings of a highly accident prone, sex obsessed, boy crazy, immature, neurotic, socially inept, Christmas loving, moderately drunken midwestern girl with a Girl Scout Cookie addiction. You complete me. (But seriously, naked grandma boobs? How the hell does that search get you to here?)

Brotherly Love

I had lunch with my brother today.

Cap: Ok, see you. Be good.

Me: Yeah, see you soon. (pause) I'm not going to be good.

Cap: Oh, ok. Well go fuck yourself then.

Amberance, Simplified

You know you have chosen the right person as your best friend when they know you well enough to distill your entire existence into three words and a drawing. For example, MY best friend H-Town made this for me on Someecards yesterday:

That's the kind of person you should be looking for. If they can explain what exactly a barometer is measuring, that's handy as well (I've been assured it doesn't count how many baros there are, nor tell you the direction of the nearest drinking establishment).

Just As An Aside

When editing that last post, Blogger spell check said I should be spelling Schaumburg "Scumbag".

Oh IKEA, I Am Such Your Bitch.

So here was the situation: having recently bought a Princess Leia slave costume, slutty Hogwart's student costume and sexy Christmas elf costume, I found that I was entirely out of room in my costume drawer* and also that I didn't have any other drawers. It was obvious that I needed another dresser. (Also because if I had another dresser I might be able to fit all the buildings in my Christmas village into one scene. For real, this is how I pick out furniture.) And for that I would need to go to IKEA.

There was only one problem: I don't really have time to go to IKEA. IKEA is a magical world full of rooms you wish you lived in, unpronounceable words and meatballs. And they build them like a Vegas casino in that once you're inside they hide all the exits to prevent you from getting out. You can lose three days in IKEA and not even realize it, and I can't have that happen right now because I have other shit to do (such as buying more slutty costumes - the Halloween stores only appear once a year people).

So this was my plan: I went online and checked inventory for the things I wanted (because I was also buying a night stand so as to hide my little bottles of lube in a drawer, yet have them still handily nearby) and I wrote down what aisle and bin I could find them in when I got to Schaumburg IKEA. That way I could bypass the Maze of Wonder and go straight to the warehouse and I would only lose the time it took for me to drive to Schaumburg and back (oh, also I actually printed out the directions for getting there. I always think I know how to get there, but IKEA Schaumburg is tricky in that you can see it from the highway and surrounding streets, but it is almost impossible to find the actual entrance. I once drove around for an hour before figuring it out).

My plan was sound. Really. It was. EXCEPT.

What I did not account for, because there was no way I could have known, is that right next to the place where they store the flatbed carts was a great big fucking display of Christmas decorations. IT WAS A SWEDISH CHRISTMAS WONDERLAND. It might as well have been a giant pile of crack. Clearly I wasn't going anywhere. There were shiny things! There were trees! There were adorable strings of snowflake shaped LED lights OMFG GIMME GIMME MORE MORE MORE MORE!

Yeah.

I have no idea how long I was trapped inside the holiday vortex - it could have been hours, it could have been weeks. What I do know is this: flat-packed dressers are fucking heavy.

I found this out while trying to wrestle one off of the shelf. I was really annoyed with myself because I've been weight training every other morning since April and I really ought to be able pick up and carry a four bedroom house by now. I was also really annoyed when an IKEA employee the size of an MMA fighter watched me have a cat fight with a box trying to get it into my car by myself while he calmly collected empty carts.

Upon returning home and dumping off my new possessions (after wrestling them up three flights of stairs first, natch) it was obvious that the only way to fix the fact that I'd wasted half a day wandering mesmerized through a warehouse and that I now had arms with the approximate strength of cooked spaghetti was to drink several margaritas and call it "lunch", then go drunk grocery shopping while simultaneously phoning the comic in England and then yelling at him for answering his phone when I wanted to leave a message. I wound up spending $52 on chocolate syrup.

Thanks, IKEA.


*I was giving an inventory of my huge collection of stereotypically slutty bedroom outfits (nurse, french maid, etc.) to a friend in an e-mail and got this response back, "You are either the perfect woman or a stripper."

Well, I Can Die Now.

It has finally happened: I have managed to call in on the appropriate day at the appropriate time in order to be live on the most inappropriate and brilliant podcast ever recorded*. Check out episode 202 of Total Talk Nonsense with Jon and Scott and you can hear me chat with them about the blog, football, the Blackhawks, my amazing pants, catholic school, conspiracy theories, Scooby Doo, vacation, boys who only call when drunk and boys who don't call at all. Unfortunately, I forgot to talk about Scientology, my Super Secret Project and to use the phrase "want to ride that like I stole it" in regards to the boy who doesn't call. I'll just have to get myself invited on the show again at some point. While you're at it, why not just subscribe to Total Talk Nonsense so you can download and listen to all the episodes? It's the only place you're going to find the original tet-anus.


*In suburban Chicago, Illinois.

I Like It Stuffed Up My Ass. I Just Hope It Doesn't Burst While It's In There*

For those that missed it, last week on Facebook there was a rash of women leaving status messages about where they "liked it" i.e. "I like on the floor next to my bed" or "I like it on the washing machine". You, the reader (especially the male reader) were obviously supposed to think this was a declaration of where this lady prefers to screw. What she actually meant was that this is where she stores her purse when she gets home from her long day of frivolous shopping and shitty parallel parking attempts. There is a name for people who do this sort of thing. These people are called "teases" and they are no fun at parties or the drive in.

For the most part I really love internet memes - I've been to Candy Mountain, IMMD and I can, in fact, has cheezburger. What I don't like is what appears to be a trend (remember the "what color my bra is" bullshit?) of women on Facebook ganging up to fuck with people while they giggle behind their hands. Stop it, you uncreative sheep. It's dumb. Also nobody likes a tease.


*I don't actually carry a purse, but I am an international drug mule.

Fish: Adept at Innuendo

Fish: Excited about Bermuda? Will you be visiting the triangle?

Me: Someone will be visiting a triangle.

Fish: Oh I see what you did there.

College Football Wrap Up

What a day!

• #1 Alabama lost to South Carolina. I am only marginally upset that Lou Holtz called this.
• Boise State needs to stop wearing the blue on blue uniforms at home. They blend into the field and I can't frikkin' see them.

Boise State (may or may not be appearing in your picture)

• Spartans beat the Wolverines (again). Suck it, Blue.
• O-H! With the Alabama loss I am very interested to see the BSC rankings when they come out next week. Also congrats to Coach Tressel on 100 wins and your uncanny ability to look like my dad.
• Proposal: LSU is the most entertaining team to watch in all of college football. Please state your disagreements in the comments so I can tell you why you are wrong.

The Insanity Has Begun

It's getting to be that time of year when I go completely insane*. The two biggest events of the year are right around the corner: Christmas, the best holiday ever invented, and then the most glorious day of all days, MY BIRTHDAY.

Yes, I do know it's September and that Christmas starts in November** and my birthday is in January. I am running out of time! There is planning to do! For the inevitable Christmas cross-stitching marathon, I have patterns to design and thread to buy. More importantly, I have to brush up on my knowledge of structural engineering.

Why? I'm glad you asked.

Faithful readers of Bizzybiz, prepare yourselves for the Greatest Birthday Cake of All Time. Seriously. My volcano cake from a few years back? Child's play. The Flying Spaghetti Monster cake? Amateur hour. The Death Star cake and accompanying X-Wing and Tie Fighter cakes? Pure crap. This cake, my friends, this cake is going to be such a triumph you will cry tears of joy at the majesty of it. You will be at odds with yourself wanting to eat it because you know it will taste like love and rainbows but also not wanting to eat it because if you do you won't be able to look at it and bask in the glow of the heavenly light that surely will be shining down upon it. Provided that I can fortify this delicious monument to my birth enough to keep it standing up and to transport it from my kitchen to the bar - hence my needing a tutorial in How To Build Things That Don't Immediately Fall Over.

As I said at the beginning, it is that time of year.

*as opposed to my normal baseline level of insane.
**The 40 Days of Christmas, invented not by me but someone else (in all fairness someone equally as unbalanced as I am), begins on November 16th for those who have not been around in previous years to roll their eyes at me.

In Which Amberance Is Too Amberancy For Her Own Good

Most of the time I'm pretty good at impressing boys, because, let's face it, apart from the tits and the vagina, I am one. The average guy seems to really enjoy the fact that I can intelligently discuss football and hockey, know positions and formations and who the players are, and most importantly the fact that I never claim to enjoy such and such player because "he is so hot"*. Your nerdier type of guy is usually drawn in by the fact that I can recite the entire original Star Wars trilogy verbatim from memory, or that I'm happy to debate Kirk vs. Picard for as long as it takes to convince you that it is obviously Picard. By the time the conversation turns to sex (and the conversation ALWAYS turns to sex) every guy around thinks I am their dream girl. I'm happy to point out and then join you ogling that girl over there who is falling out of her shirt, after all, that IS an incredible rack! Girls need to be less selfish and uptight: blow jobs and anal sex for everyone, all the time! And did you see the centerfold in Playboy last month? Oh, because I subscribe, that's how I saw it.

The thing is, and here's the rub (heh): the above behavior is the kind of thing that works best in a group setting. When you're one on one it can be kind of off putting in that it comes off as overly aggressive, and when you're one on one with your really hot friend who is so attractive he distracts you and throws you off your game it can be a disaster. Such as when he is nice enough to drive you home and he makes a comment as he's dropping you off about the hilarious squeakiness of your vinyl pants. Answering that statement with a pouty sounding "Well you were SUPPOSED to take them off me!" can quickly make you go from "this girl is really cool" to "this woman is fucking terrifying". I should probably apologize for that. You know who you are.




*Seriously girls who like sports, this is annoying. Stop doing it. I'm not saying you can't think they're hot, but you need to keep that shit to yourself and not bring it up in the middle of a conversation about whether or not the Wildcat can continue to be an effective formation in the NFL now that the defenses are prepared for it (it can't).

A Night Out With Gene Yaas (The Few Bits I Remember Of It Anyway)

I have to blog about Saturday night because I have not kept up with my promise to post weekly dirty grocery lists and because I vaguely recall telling some people that I would write about it. Also because the comic has a blog now and I refuse to allow him to outblog me. Unacceptable.

My friend Jon of the brilliant Total Talk Nonsense podcast was filling in on drums for his friends' band for a gig that was in the city. Jon is suburban folk and is never in the city, so it seemed like a good opportunity to hang out without having to drive to the middle of nowhere and then not drink because I'd have to drive back.

The evening started out in the way that most of my evenings out typically end: with me nearly falling over and some vague molestation. Due to my own sheer stupidity, I thought I should take the red line train at the same time the Cubs game ended, thus ensuring that I would be crammed into a train car with the maximum number of douchebags possible. One of those douchebags was the guy who got on the train directly behind me. I admit, the train was very crowded, but given that I was not glued to the back of the person standing in front of me, I don't think it was quite crowded enough to have him pasted up against me like wall paper. Turning sideways was not helpful either. No matter how I tried to adjust my stance I couldn't get this guy (literally) off my ass. And then he started slightly humping me. Seriously. Weirdly I was far less concerned about the rapiness of the situation than I was about that fact I was having a hard time standing upright in heels with this guy's full weight pushing me forward. Either way it was bad so I ended up getting off at the next stop and waiting for the next train which blessedly was filled with only the normal, non-rapey, drunk Cubs fan type of douchebags.

Jon et al. (we'll get to them in a minute) were playing at US Beer Company. I had never been there before. I don't anticipate being there again. It's the most poorly named bar I've ever patronized - they have a whopping four beers on tap, one of which they were out of, and about a dozen bottles, a third of which they were out of. It didn't matter much because tracking down a bartender was about as frustrating as hunting a Sasquatch. The stage is adjacent to the bar and faces a wall about eight feet away, so your choices for viewing the band are to stand right in front of them which feels creepy and stalkerish, or sit off to their right where there are chairs and tables and also a huge cabinet blocking most of the view. The sound guy was on his second day working there, looked nervous and appeared to be 12 years old. I sat at the bar and peered between the cabinets and the 12 year old, from which I could see the tip of Jon's sticks, a microphone stand and part of Gene's right shoe.

Gene Yaas is a band I had actually heard before on an episode of TTN*. They play what they describe as "adult goof rock" which is incredibly accurate. It's rock music with lyrics that are slightly x-rated, extremely funny and entirely absurd. You'll like it. They have an album, you can buy it here or the other usual places (iTunes and such the like). Jon was filling in for the drummer, who was filling in for the lead guitarist, who was missing in action (the band claim he has been deported, but I suspect they got that information at www.madethefuckup.com). There were supposed to be four bands, but three of them didn't show up, so Gene Yaas had the show to themselves, which worked out great because everyone in the place had come just to see them anyway. It was suggested they even do an extended set which would have been cool, but unfortunately Jon had only learned 12 songs. They sounded great in spite of the nervous 12 year old.

At some point someone realized that one band was not going to be enough live music to cover the night and called in the back up plan. The back up plan was a hip hop group - the kind that inexplicably hold their microphones upside down and have a guy on the stage whose entire job seems to be standing there and nodding. It didn't really follow from Gene Yaas. It was funny, just not on purpose.

From here things start to get hazy. The problem is that I know this is the part of the night that I told people I would blog about because everyone was saying things that were funny, but all I remember is the laughing part. I have no idea what the details were. Drinking is bad, kids. I know that everyone liked my dress (which was as inappropriate as my t-shirts and reads "You want me to suck what?") and that Gene Marteen know something about Buckeye football that impressed me (no idea what) but that he didn't know what he was supposed to do when someone yelled "O-H!". The only thing I remember in detail is talking to Scott about the quality of various brands of telescopes, because it is a law of social functions that the two nerdiest people will start a conversation that absolutely no one else cares about. I think I also mentioned that humpback whales look like giant pickles, apropos of nothing. I was obviously a brilliant conversationalist (luckily I was the only girl in the group so I think they all gave me the benefit of the doubt).

By the way, protip: If you ever buy a telescope, make sure you also buy a red flashlight. It takes at least a half hour for your eyes to get acclimated to the viewer, and using a regular flashlight when you're changing the filters means your eyes will have to adjust all over again. A red flashlight will allow you to see enough to change filters without ruining your night vision. You're welcome.



*I went back and listened to it again today, which I do not recommend. It starts out fine, but they quickly get overJamesoned and it turns into a train wreck. I believe I said to Jon and Scott that it was the most excruciating thing I had ever heard, and that was after they had played audio the week before of Bill O'Reilly reading some sort of pornographic drug story. Some of the best sound clips they have now were taken from the drunken ramblings of the band's front man on that episode. Jon reminded me he had been on the show after he introduced him to me on Saturday, to which I said after a beat, "Oh. He's THAT Gene Marteen." He turned out to be really adorable and not at all annoying, but also the bar didn't have any Jameson.

Is Star Trek Voyager Good For You?

It's a question we've all asked ourselves at one time or another. I personally have spent many hours pondering it:

I can't stop staring at Jeri Ryan's tits, and I think I've developed a Borg fetish. Can this be good for me?

I'm not sure if I want to give Neelix a great big hug or punch him square in the face. Can this show be good for me?

And so on for 172 episodes.

Good news everyone! The comic (this guy) and his friend Brian (who bears a startling resemblance to Neelix) have a new show this week at the Camden Fringe that answers this very question and is coincidentally titled "Is Star Trek Voyager Good For You?" FELLOW NERDS, THIS IS WHAT YOU HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR. The show is this Thursday, August 12 (or 12 August depending on where you live) at the Roundhouse Studio Theatre in Camden, London, England. Tickets are £7.50 and are available here.

Go because this is an important question to have answered. Go because it's going to be absolutely hilarious. Go because I need you to report back to me with a full transcript* as I'll be trapped in the United States on Thursday and won't be able to see it. IT IS ONE NIGHT ONLY so be there before the answer is lost to you forever.

*With helpful footnotes and drawings please.

Amberance: Happy Yet Full of Rage

I have mixed feelings about the weekend festivities in Canton, Ohio. I was happy for Jerry Rice and Emmitt Smith, though I had to tune it out when Smith started crying. I'm not saying men shouldn't cry, mind you, I'm just saying they shouldn't do it on television.

The bartender and I were excited to watch the Hall of Fame Game at first, enough to scrap tentative plans to drive to Green Bay for a Social D concert even. In retrospect we might have been better off with the 7-8 hour round trip drive. The game turned out to be such a shit storm that we turned it off at halftime. Still, even though it was one of the most crap games I've ever seen (and mind you, I'm a 32 year Browns fan), it means that football is back and I am delighted.
In related news, my next door neighbor remarked that my new dark auburn and purple hair looked like Ravens colors. (Long pause while I count to ten) OK Matt, look. Number one: no it does not. It's a reddish brown, not black. Number two: Fuck off. And number three: IF YOU EVER SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT AGAIN I WILL THROW YOU OFF THE FUCKING PORCH.

Note to my readers: Your mother lied. Counting to ten does not work.

The Scientific Method Step 7: Publish Results

I formed a hypothesis at this years Tai's charity golf outing in Galena that the real reason people golf is for the sexual innuendo*. Based on the swearing and frustration, I don't think there's any way people could be golfing for fun. I cite several examples from the foursome** I was in, aptly named Team Spank:

-(The bartender on the green): This is wetter than I thought.

-(Bob and Sarah sorting out golf balls) Bob: Sarah, did you grab both of my balls? Sarah: No, and that's my ball in the trap.

-(Bob, encouraging the bartender in a sand trap): Whack it away. Just go right at it.

-(The bartender, commenting on the little prize flag stuck in the green): We'd find out about closest to the hole.


The discussion is open. Opinions?

*In YOUR end-o.
**While I was technically in a foursome, I didn't actually golf. Not that they didn't try to make me. Sometimes I love being left-handed.

The Jury Is Still Out

On the golf course, watching porn on Big Ron's iPhone

The bartender: Who is this? I thought this was going to be someone we knew.

Me: It is. It's me.

The bartender: No it's not because this girl has a hairy snatch.

Big Ron: How would you know?

Me: Everyone knows, Ron. Everyone knows.

Long pause. The porn gets louder and I can hear it from 15 feet away.

Me: That's the loudest iPhone I've ever heard.

Big Ron: Oh. Well then maybe it is you.

Amberance: Prison Sexpert

"Do you want some more corn bread?" asked the bartender tonight at the dinner table.

"No, I want to stab him in the eye." I had been telling him about my hellish day at work that involved an hour and half long "15-minute" meeting, complete with a pointless impromptu phone call to someone who wasn't expecting it and was clearly annoyed by it, and being strong armed into a fancy dinner with a client later this week involving 5 people I've never met and a restaurant where I'll be completely out of my element, thus guaranteeing my social phobias will have me throwing up in the bathroom instead of eating.

"Well ok, but you'll wind up in prison. Hope you like broom handles."

I thought about whether or not I did, in fact, like broom handles. "Crap. All right, I guess I won't stab him in the eye, because I don't think I could handle prison."

"Actually, I don't know about that. You might be able to find a niche. Because you know how in prison people have to improvise weapons out of what they have around? Maybe you could do the same thing except you could improvise sex toys. You'd be good at that."

I lit up like a Christmas tree. "Dude, I could TOTALLY improvise sex toys, I'd be awesome at it! Seriously, I can make a sex toy out of almost anything!" (I can.)

"Yeah, and then you'd have your niche and you'd be ok."

So it looks like I could probably survive prison. It's always good to have a plan, I think.

Parsnip. Celery stalk. Ooo, Hand of Ginger!

My comment in the previous post about the possibility of posting a grocery list made me start thinking of an actual grocery list post, and how I could possibly make that interesting. And as is par for the course for me, I almost immediately turned to the idea of a dirty grocery list. Because I am that person who can't walk through the produce section without thinking something absolutely inappropriate.

Problem is, I got as far as "carrot" and I had to stop. There used to be a show on Spike TV called 1000 Ways to Die. It may still be on actually, I just stopped watching Spike when I discovered Top Gear on BBC America. Anywhore, one of the ways to die was a story about a girl who went to the grocery store, bought a carrot, and decided to masturbate with it. Which at first sounds like a really good idea. Until you find out that she ended up with a tiny tiny cut inside her that an air bubble got into, which made it's way into her bloodstream causing a gas embolism which killed her. Now, I'm an unapologetic frequent fiddler, but that doesn't mean I like the idea of my roommate having to explain to my parents how he found my cold, lifeless body laying there with a root vegetable in a place that was never made for a root vegetable to be in. Or any vegetable for that matter. Because I also had a vision of someone writing "coochcumber" underneath my name on my headstone, the joke being on me for all of eternity, and it was not a nice vision (again, with the parents and the visiting and all). So the dirty grocery list is now on hold until I can get my mind out of the produce section, which will clearly be the death of me.

On My Long Absence

It's not that I'm taking a break from the blog, or that the blog is dead, or even that I don't have anything interesting to write about. It's that I've been dealing with the worst case of writer's block I can ever recall. This needs to end and it needs to end now, because I love writing this blog, and also because I've promised to write some things for a few people and I feel that I've let them down. So starting now there will be something up here at least once a week. This week, at the very least, there will be a review of the agent's new album that he put out a few months ago and that I promised to review even before it was finished. Next week, at the very least, there will be a plug for the comic's new show at the Camden Fringe. I don't know what will be up the week after that, but there will be something, even if it's nothing more than a grocery list. Because this is getting ridiculous already.